Long story short, for a week and a half, all that UPS could tell me was that the truck was "misrouted" and they were trying to locate it. How an entire trailer goes missing I have no idea. Eventually they found it in Columbus, OH and after 2 weeks of camping in a sleeping bag in my new apartment, the truck arrived.

The same trailer that I packed in CA arrived at my place in TX and nothing looked wrong with it from the outside. However, it was a completely different story when I had the driver open it up. I could immediately see that the bulkhead I had installed (secured by the driver back in CA) had been moved. My wall of plywood was installed at a diagonal (and somehow spray painted) and when I removed it there were two large wood palettes that I certainly did not pack.

My stuff had been completely damaged. Boxes were smashed, furniture in pieces and my wrapped mattress and boxspring were now filthy and covered in drag marks. Everything was rearranged in a different order than I had packed it, it had obviously been unpacked and thrown back on the truck at some point. As I began the unpacking process to see what was salvageable, I noticed that kitchen items were now in containers mixed with bathroom stuff....not how I packed it. (pics at #)

On Help U Move's website, they have a picture of a couple moving their belongings. If these companies are not supposed to be moving household goods/furniture, then there is some serious false advertising going on. Based on the comments, it looks like these companies are putting the blame on how the consumer packs, but if everything is being moved around along the way, how is that even relevant?

I'm currently going through the claims process with UPS but dont have much hope after seeing this story. At this point, I paid $850 plus $250 for professional movers to help load/unload and I'm told I MIGHT get back $1000 since Help U Move estimated the weight of my stuff to be 1000 lbs. Basically I paid them to destroy my belongings.

Do not use these companies!